


The Centre Of Everything

by iamisaac



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Community: hp_nextgen_fest, Developing Relationship, Harry Potter Next Generation, M/M, Masturbation, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-15
Updated: 2017-11-15
Packaged: 2019-01-08 16:55:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12258360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamisaac/pseuds/iamisaac
Summary: The story of two boys growing up together – the story of a life.





	The Centre Of Everything

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to MM for looking over this for me <3 Prompter, I hope this was something like what you were after – it was a joy to write.

Teddy hates it when James is born. Actually, it starts before that, when his Harry - _his_ Harry – starts fawning over Auntie Ginny’s tummy, whispering words to the interloper which is apparently in there. _Teddy_ is Harry’s darling, Teddy is the one who gets the words about what a wonderful child he is, how much Harry loves him. Teddy. Not that other one. He’s never even enjoyed sharing Harry with Victoire, and Teddy likes Victoire. She’s pretty to look at and she likes frogs. Plus he can always catch her when they play chase because he’s got longer legs, even if he doesn’t cheat and morph them a bit longer still. But he doesn’t like it anyway when Harry pays her attention and not him.

The baby can have Auntie Ginny, who is lovely but she’s not Harry. Harry is Teddy’s.

Except Harry doesn’t seem to know this, and thinks the baby is wonderful, even before he’s born. Maybe he won’t want Teddy any more. Teddy’s parents left him. Maybe Harry will leave him too.

Teddy hates it when James is born.

*

Except he doesn’t. Because this little wailing thing is – strangely appealing. Especially when James gets to toddling, and will follow Teddy around saying “Te, Te,” and holding his chubby hands out because in James’s eyes Teddy is the most marvellous person in the whole wide world. James has parents, he’s not an orphan like Teddy, yet he still thinks Teddy is best.

Oh, Teddy still resents the time that James takes of Harry’s, just as he will secretly resent Albus and Lily in a similar way (Harry had a baby, all right, maybe Auntie Ginny wanted one, but was there really need to have more?) but he doesn’t hate _James_. James himself is quite sweet.

*

He misses James when he goes to Hogwarts. He also fails to attend James’s sixth birthday, which comes a week after term starts – the first time he’s ever missed that event, and it feels wrong. He spends the 7th September in a sort of daze. He hadn’t expected to feel like this – who on earth misses a six year old, especially one to whom they’re not technically related? But he does. More than Gran, and more even than Harry in some ways, because Gran and Harry write but James is six and he’s too little for letters. Sometimes Teddy gets a drawing from him, though, with a few scribbly words; Teddy is always in it, and he can always recognise himself because even when James draws in black and white, Teddy gets blue hair. Always.

But the years pass, and Teddy has other friends – cool friends his own age, with whom to play tricks and visit during holidays. He’s still fond of James, and James still follows him around when Teddy goes to Harry’s – which is often, even now. It’s not quite the same, though, not any more.

*

James starts Hogwarts. James, Teddy thinks, wants it written in lights and hung above the very castle itself. You would think that no one had ever started there before. Teddy can see that James thinks – no, _knows_ \- he will be a star, shining so bright that no one can possibly miss him. Teddy loves James, and wants to slap him for his arrogant certainty, all in one go. It will not be the only time he feels this way.

Teddy watches James get sorted into Gryffindor – no surprise there – from his position at the Hufflepuff table, Head Boy badge pinned neatly and unobtrusively to his front. He claps and cheers, and sees the unexpected little look that James sends him, the one with a hint of nerves; the one which says ‘did I do good?’ He winks at him, and changes his hair for a few seconds to crimson and gold; watches as James smiles back in relief.

*

The worst – and the best – thing is that James really is ‘all that’. He becomes a leader at Hogwarts almost without trying, Quidditch captain in his Fourth Year, for goodness sake! By that time, Teddy is three years into his Healer’s course, studying harder than he ever did at school for considerably less reward, at least outwardly. Inwardly, he knows he’s chosen right; that he could never do anything but this. 

He still makes time to write to James once a fortnight, though – somehow, there’s still that bond there between them which there isn’t between Teddy and Harry’s other children. (He meets up for drinks, flirting and dancing with Victoire even more regularly, but that’s different. They’ve always been friends, and he loves the fact that whilst he’s learning to look after sick people, Vic’s doing the same with animals. Turns out it wasn’t just frogs that she liked.)

*

James graduates the same year that Teddy does. Six NEWTs (Transfig, DADA, Herbology, Potions, Care of Magical Creatures and History of Magic) versus six years of medical training. They tease each other over which of them is most impressive, both secretly thinking that the other one is. Six NEWTs, indeed! When Teddy was one of the top students of his year with five. (Three is the minimum to stay on; four is usual. Five is exceptional, but six is ridiculous.)

James shrugs it off, pointing out that his father is half of the History of Magic NEWT course, so he has a big advantage there. Technically, it’s the Voldemort Wars in general, but Teddy sees James’s point. Still, it isn’t like Teddy didn’t know all of that stuff, too. His parents died in the second war, after all, and he’s Harry’s Godson. He just wasn’t clever enough to think to take the subject, having been bored to tears by Goblin Wars for his OWL.

*

It’s a year later that they move in together. Well, actually, James moves in with Teddy, whose previous flatmate, Leo, got engaged, the bugger, and is buying (actually _buying_ ) a house with his fiancée. James has been living at home, and is desperate to get out as Albus is taking the piss big time about James having made a massive fuss about being a hot shot Auror trainee, only to live at home with the boss. Teddy has a spare room in his flat, and always has room in his life for James. It seems obvious.

*

It doesn’t seem obvious how jealous Teddy is going to get about James bringing boyfriends home. His ex-flatmate brought women and blokes home (usually not at the same time, though that did happen on one memorable occasion), before hooking up with his now-wife (Teddy took James to the wedding as his plus-one, and only later thought that maybe that was a bit weird). But somehow, Teddy hates it when James does the same.

It’s not that Teddy himself is celibate; he has his own flings, including with Victoire when they get drunk enough and neither of them can find anyone better. Though these days she’s found a man she’s genuinely interested in – enough that she’s taken him to meet Bill and Fleur, which is a statement of intent if ever there was one; both of Vic’s parents can be scary as hell if they want to be. They thought at one point that Teddy was messing Victoire around (he wasn’t), and it was – well, it wasn’t pretty.

None of this explains why James bringing home his conquests – who last only slightly longer in his life than Teddy’s own – pisses Teddy off so mightily.

*

Knowing what James sounds like having sex without ever having experienced it himself first hand is going to drive Teddy to despair. It’s already driven him to an awful lot of wanking; he couldn’t believe it – was mortified, in fact – the first time he started fantasising about James, but now it’s a staple part of his masturbatory activities. James, groaning and swearing underneath him…or on top of him…or against a wall; it seems Teddy’s mind and cock don’t really care much about the finer details.

Teddy is in love with a man who’s just had his twenty-first birthday, who sees him as a brother figure, and who fucks a new man (it feels like) every bloody week. None of whom are Teddy.

*

Finally, Teddy breaks. He’s not sure what, precisely, he said to the one-night-stand of James’s who asked Teddy to make him breakfast next morning, but James will later claim that the man came back into his bedroom a gibbering wreck who barely found his shoes before Disapparating without a word. When James himself later appears, still damp from the shower, Teddy turns on him, ranting incoherently about manners and morals and _not bringing home a different bloke every fucking night, James, in fact I’ve had it to here with your flings._

“Who am I supposed to fuck, then?” James asks, his hazel eyes showing amusement rather than anything else. “You?”

Teddy surprises himself – but not, it seems, James – by growling “Yes,” and pulling James into a fierce, possessive kiss.

James returns it with interest, and when they stop – some time later – says with a big sigh of relief, “Finally.”

*

Skin sliding against skin. Hot, panting breaths and filthy words of passion. James is dragged willingly into Teddy’s room, where he makes those noises, those wonderful-awful noises which Teddy has known so well second hand; but this time, he makes them for Teddy. And more – oh, so much more. James feasts upon Teddy as if he is a starving man. As if he has been waiting his life to be in Teddy’s bed, in Teddy’s arms.

A groan. A thrusting movement. In, out, in, out; like breathing, but also not. Not when breaths come so quickly, so desperately. Then a gasp, the warmth of liquid against skin, fingers clenching tightly into muscle. Eyes wide open, gazing at each other with an emotion they’d never dared show before.

Perfection.

*

James doesn’t quite admit – not then – that the parade of men had been an attempt to gain Teddy’s attention. But it is noticeable how willing he is to give them all up for Teddy. Teddy isn’t prepared to be a sometime-lover, the way he has been with Victoire in the past. He wants it all with James: fidelity, domesticity, the lot. He’s worried at first that James, with his apparently endless supply of willing blokes, won’t be content with that. But to his surprise, when he brings the subject up, James stares at him with an intense gaze and mutters fiercely that no _way_ is Teddy having anyone else.

Teddy hadn’t even considered that possibility, but he doesn’t tell James that. Instead, he nods calmly and says that it’s agreed. Inside, he cheers.

*

James is terrified when they decide to tell his parents. Teddy doesn’t understand to begin with, but James mutters something about work, and Teddy realises that James won’t be able to avoid Harry if he’s unhappy about the situation. (If Harry is unhappy about the situation. The very thought makes Teddy miserable. He has spent his life wanting Harry’s approval and love; it seems strange that he has now found someone whose opinion he cares for more. But it makes sense, in a twisted sort of way, that it should be Harry’s son.)

But they both agree that the time is right. They’ve been dating for a couple of months, and it feels so natural. Almost nothing has changed – they both work long hours, and whoever is home first cooks dinner (unless Teddy is on night shifts, in which case James eats alone). It’s funny – Teddy and Leo, his ex-flatmate, never ate together but James and he always have done. it’s almost as if they’ve been partners for years without realising it. The only thing which has changed is the addition of sex, which is brilliant. Teddy is beginning to wonder how he ever managed without.

But Harry and Ginny are almost embarrassingly delighted when they share the news. Teddy gets the “don’t hurt my son” talk from both of them, privately; but when they get home, James tells him that he had it too, about Teddy. The laugh about it as they pull off each other’s clothes, falling into bed with as much eagerness as they had that very first time.

*

That’s something that doesn’t change over the years. They fight, and fall out – James has a temper, and Teddy does indeed work ridiculous hours; say yes, when he should say no; forget about prior engagements when he’s in the middle of something. But they always make up, and the sex is always, always, spectacular. 

Plus, Teddy knows that the things James hates about him are also the things he loves: his dedication to helping people, his kindness, his ability to focus on one thing with all his might. (James likes it best, of course, when all of these are aimed at him; but he’s not as selfish as he sometimes pretends, and Teddy knows that James would be the first to support him in anything he wanted to do.)

Teddy himself loves James’s passion and drive to make things _better_ ; it is something they share, although they go about it in very different ways. He loves his courage, and his steadfastness; the fact that a twenty-one year old could – and does – still feel the same way about him at twenty-five, at thirty.

*

When Teddy first mentions children, James’s eyes open wide, and he shakes his head frantically. No, no way, he didn’t fall in love with a bloke just to have kids put on the table. Teddy, who is an adoring godfather to Victoire’s small son, nods and acquiesces.

It is he who is surprised when some years later, it is James himself who brings the subject up. It seems time has softened his position – that, and a visit to an orphanage. James doesn’t mention the fact that both his father and Teddy were orphans, but Teddy sees the thought in his face. Teddy was lucky; Harry, he knows, less so. When James says he wants to make another child a fortunate one, Teddy can’t keep his hands off his boyfriend.

 _This_ is the sort of man he fell in love with.

*

The kids they get – Freyja and Zane – are three and five respectively. Too old for those adopters who only want a baby, but perfect for James and Teddy. Teddy has cut his hours down to part time; and Ginny has almost demanded that she look after the children when both men are at work. Neither Teddy nor James are foolish enough to look that gift horse in the mouth. (They know there are no Greeks inside this particular one.)

Teddy watches James cry real tears as he holds his daughter in his arms. Teddy himself has a lapful of Zane, whose smile is enough to fuel a thousand Patronuses. Teddy didn’t have a proper family, not really, though his Gran and Harry did wonders. Now he does. He can’t believe his luck.

*

A family. Two kids. And at the centre of everything, just as he always has been, James.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for viewing! You can show your appreciation for the author in a comment here or on [livejournal](https://hp-nextgen-fest.livejournal.com/119993.html).


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